Canadian food prices

22Jun

We’ve seen the recent food price protests in Nunavut, where some families are trying desperately to budget each month. They’ll pay a little over 100 dollars for a case of water. What’s the rest of the country look like as far as food prices go? MSN Money put the list together from statistics and surveys collected by Stats Canada.

The prairie provinces come in as some of the best in the country.

The cheapest place to buy food is Saskatchewan, where families spend 9.1% of the yearly income on groceries and meals out. Yearly budgets average $6,344, and of that 24% is spent on meals out at restaurants.

Next, Albertans budget 9.2% of their annual income on groceries. While they spend over $85,000 on consumer goods (the most in the country), they only spend $7,570 per year on food.

Ontario comes in next with only 9.5% of annual budgets spent on food, spending $7,284 to fill up the fridge, but of that, $1,645 is spent eating out at diners and eateries.

Manitoba comes in at number four as the annual food budget is 9.8%. The average Manitoba household spends $6,,520 annually.

So those are the top four, with Ontario breaking up the prairies by sneaking in at third. What about the highest places? Unsurprisingly, the territories have some of the most expensive places to budget for food. The Yukon is not one of those (though, families do set aside 10.5% of their annual budget for food). The Northwest Territories is the best of the most expensive, with annual household budgets for food sitting at 11.5%, spending $9,500 a year on food. And that’s only because household spending in the Northwest Territories is on of the highest in the country (total consumer spending is almost $83,000 per year).

Prince Edward Island comes in next, where the annual food budget is 11.8% of the total household budget. While spending $6,720 per year on food may not seem like much, that’s because total consumer spending in the island province sits around $56,000 per year.

Quebec, like P.E.I., doesn’t really spend a lot on food per year (only $7,215 per year), but again, the annual budget has 12% of it set aside for food. Consumer spending in Quebec sits at just over $60,000 per year.

The list has gradually moved up and up, going from 9.1% to 12%, but the highest food budget in Canada takes a massive jump. With no surprise, it happens to be Nunavut, where families have to budget 17.5% of their annual income just for food. Households spend just over $84,000 per year on consumer goods (second highest in Canada, Alberta spends the most); of that, over $14,000 is spent on food. This is more than double what families in Saskatchewan have to pay for food each year.

One has to begin to ask themselves, why? Why is a place like the Northwest Territories, geographically located in a similar situation to Nunavut, paying less for food annually? A great deal less as a matter of fact.